Eye school part one:

Hard, soft and diffused light.

Look at the hardness (or softness) of light is certainly the most simple and easy way to
classify it.
However, we can never call a certain light shaper hard or soft (with the exception of a
point light source that is always hard). Depending on the sizes and the distance
between the object and the light, the same light shaper can once be hard, soft or even
diffused.
Lets have a closer look at these three categories:
1. Hard light:

Looking at the light of a point light source, we will see very

clearly defined shadows. On a background or underground there
is either light or shadow, but nothing in between, with no
gradations. Even the finest details provoke a clear shadow.
The structure of any object (e.g. textile, skin) is pointed out very
clearly.
A very hard lightsource is the only one that does not change its
characteristics if we vary the distance (but according to the
inverse square law it does change the power). The shadows
remain the same: very sharp.
Hard lights may increase the contrast of the object. The areas
directly lit may be burnt while the shadows remain very dark.
The hardness of the light finally has an influence on the color
saturation. Small, hard lights increase the saturation of the picture
while soft, and especially diffused lights reduce it

The following light shapers can be used as hard lights:

Any open reflector like P70, P65, P45, P50, Reflector Par
if used over a certain distance; a few meters and more.
Fresnel spots like Pulso Flooter, Pulso Spot 4, Fresnell
spot attachment for picolite.
Optical systems like Pulso Spot 4 with 150mm optical
snoot, projection attachment for picolite and Profil 15/42.
Sunlite set, litestick or bare bulps (lamphead with no
attachments at all).

2. Soft Light:

Average soft lightsources have about the same sizes as the objects
or set-ups they illuminate: Lets say a 50 by 50 cm softbox for a
narrow cropped portrait or a 80 by 140cm softbox for a fullbody
shot.
The shadows on undergrounds and backgrounds are still clearly
visible, even when they are not sharply defined anymore. Big
parts of these shadows are graduated and a small cores hadow
still exists. Small and fine details however do not appear.
The texture of our object is now shown in a lower contrast and is
therefore not as clear as in a hard light.
Soft light still increases the contrast of the object a little, but less
than a hard one.
The colorsaturation finally is somewhere in between the one
derived from a hard light (high) and a diffused light (low).
Being soft, our lightsource got a certain size (it is not a point
anymore) and the distance from it becomes very important:
The closer we get, the bigger the lightsource becomes (seen from
the perspective of the object or model). This means that our light
becomes softer, when we get closer, and harder, when we use it
over larger distances.
A light of about 100 by 100cm placed at 4 meters from the model
has the same hardness as a source of half the size (50 by 50 cm)
at half the distance (2 meters). Due to the inverse square law we
have to expect other effects (higher contrast when placing the
light closer to the object or model).
When we bring the 100 by 100 cm softbox to half the distance
(we will have to reduce the power by about 2 f-stops) the light
will be a lot softer.

The following light shapers can be used as soft lights:

Any size softbox (choose the dimensions and the position
carefully!)
Acrylic arealights such as Hazysoft, Boxlite 40 (for rather
small objects), Satelite Staro.
The soft spots such as Satelite evolution, Minisatelite
when completely focussed. Their light is directed (not
diffused), but they have a large diameter and are therefore
soft.
Softlight reflector P-soft.
Para FB focussed and defocussed

3. Diffused light:

Now the lightsource is huge. Shadows no longer exist as the light

is big enough to shine all around the object or model.
The light does not show any direction anymore, the only contrast
remaining in the photograph is the contrast of the object itself.
The structure of the objects surface is as flat as possible, almost
invisible and the color saturation is heavily reduced.

The following light shapers can be used as diffused lights:

Big softboxes at short distances for rather small objects.
Indirect lights reflected by several bright walls. (These
walls have to be neutral in color to avoid a color shift).
Light-tents wrapped around the object.

A good example to illustrate the difference of hard and soft shadows:

Through a very narrow opening of curtains, daylight is falling into this hotelroom.
Horizontally, the opening is only a few centimeters wide the corresponding shadows
are very hard. The vertical shadows however are very soft because the curtains let some
light in from the ceiling to the floor.
In the studio, this effect can be simulated with narrow Striplites like the Striplite 120 or,
with some limitations, a Pulsoflex EM 30x110 and EM 40x155.

This text is the beginning of the first chapter of Urs Rechers book Light Architecture 2. You
can read more about it on this website.